Feb. 11, 2006 by John Hawley So-called koi-respondent Hawley addresses his technological deficiencies as opportunities in the hobby ramp up from South Beach to Southern California. |
Filipowski's Kokugyo Prize winner at All Japan Show 2006 |
Here we are again with your slippery news reporter the koi-respondent with tales of our latest flops and splash in the hobby. The first February Koi Club of the Air show was pulled off in spite of some technical difficulties putting another one "in the pond" ("in the bag" for non-koi folks) as we say at KCOTA. That show was comprised of our regular in-studio segments and four interviews including two with several of Florida’s most well-known koi hobbyists who assisted in putting on the 1st Annual Gainesville Koi, Goldfish, and Water Garden Club Koi Show (http://www.pondhoppers.org). Our technical difficulties become evident to show listeners as our voices recorded poorly while telephone interviewing Bill Thompson, the San Diego Koi club (www.koiclubsandiego.org) president who is also their 2006 show chair. We discussed with him their upcoming show, and his role as a KOI USA Director. They put on a top-notch show and are having a wet lab seminar this year. Check them out!
Thompson’s voice sounds good, but our voices sounded no better than CB radio sidebander’s. The same was true of the show interview with Dr. Andrew Goodwin, Phd. director of the Aquaculture Dept. at the University of Arkansas, Pine Bluff (http://www.uaex.edu/aqfi/people/faculty/agoodwin) about his search for hobbyist's koi ucler DNA. Please do the CSI-style swabbing of any koi or goldfish ulcers your fish might have and then drop the whole thing in a 70 percent solution of alcohol and send it to the good doctor.
Andy’s voice sounded terrific, but our voices were bad enough to prompt renewed vigor in the search for improved VOIP telephony (Internet phone) to replace our antiquated analog phone recording system. It took a few days, but we pulled if off with a service that is compatible with the dinero in our wallets and our desire to have conference call functionality suitable for computer to land line connections internationally. Now we can carry out that plan of recording conference roundtable discussions with Joe Pawlak, president of Blackwater Creek Koi Farms (one of our sponsors at http://www.koisale.com) and some of his renowned associates in the Koi breeding Holy Land of Japan’s Niigata Prefectural. It will help aside from the show in documenting discussions where we brainstorm and storyboard with Joe for his periodic newsletter content and book.
The technology has advanced to such a level of sophistication that what we had envisioned a year ago has come to fruition. Receiving telephone calls via the digital Internet ether and recording them in a high quality format had been a lingering unresolved issue for us. Field interviews with the likes of Don Hellard and Joe White at the Gainesville show were good, but the phone interviews were indeed a problem. Our upcoming discussions with them or maybe Henry Culpepper and Rod Lawton about the upcoming Annual Central Florida Show will be made easier. Now things can go even more swimmingly regardless of whether we are in the studio, in the field, or on the telephone. No more strikes for bad technology and lack of know-how.
Our improved audio production capability at the Koi Club of the Air doesn’t come a moment too soon as on February 24th we will be recording an interview with Entrepreneur, New Economy Business Startup Developer Guru Andrew Filipowski. Flip is the owner of the koi that won the 80bu female Kokugyo Prize at the 37th All Japan Combined Koi Show held January 21 and 22, 2006. Filipowski is the first American owner to receive this award. "For better or worse, Andrew Filipowski, CEO of Divine, Inc.—perhaps better known as "Flip"—is the closest thing the digital content industry has to a rock star," according to Econtent Magazine (http://www.econtentmag.com/Articles/ArticlePrint.aspx?ArticleID=4289 ). "Flip cruises around on a private jet sporting a leather jacket and waist-length hair,…Flip's last rock and roll hoochie coup, Platinum Technology, Inc., sold to Computer Associates for $3.6 billion,..." Should we ask him if he keeps his resources as a koi might secured in a "river-bank?" Probably not, if we want to be taken seriously, but how serious are we anyhow? This is a hobby.
So while the paparazzi chase Flip about wondering where they can get the next best photo of him they might consider tuning in to hear Flip discuss his perspective on the shimi and shiro (black and white) of his kokugyo (best in size) koi. Will Flip and his finned-friend be appearing next at the 32nd Annual ZNA Southern California Chapter Koi Show on March 18 and 19 as was the course Flip took last year? We won’t be coy and avoid such questions. And Don and Chai representing that ZNA show will surely let us in on it when they appear on the koi-cast before that event.
Meanwhile, you will find this koi-respondent next weekend after the Miami Boat Show shaking-a-fin with Deanna Merryman from Wild-On E at Club Deep in SoBe atop the 2000-gallon koi aquarium dance floor. Those koi aren’t in a torpid state and neither are we!
